From Big Notebook for Easy Piano, Soaking in the Center of the Universe, Vol. 2, and Remember Cassettes, Vol. 1
Cigarettes. Drugs. Caffeine. I think there are more references to drugs in this one song than the entire rest of the canon combined. Everywhere else, the references are kind of in the background, but here the speaker relishes in all of them as only a student (or former student) at a party school in a college town could.
And what’s more, this song is fun, like more-fun-than-“Have Fun” fun. We get a quick piano intro, and then the bass exclaims, “Whoopee!” as we dive in for a three-and-a-half-minute romp that includes some of my favorite vocal harmonies to be heard on Big Notebook. In between references to various vices, we get a glimpse of a common relationship trap to plague kids in high school and college: the relationship fueled by substance abuse. From chorus to chorus, the speaker goes between wanting company and not wanting the company of his girlfriend, as if the amount of alcohol or weed or mixture thereof determines his tolerance of the girl and his willingness to pursue the relationship.
The video is from the porch of the Red Rose Coffee Shop from August 24, 2001. After the song is finished, there’s a fine example of how to conduct a sound check at a venue where you have to bring your own PA system.
Thursday, September 13, 2007
Monday, September 10, 2007
Marvel Girl
From In the New Old-Fashioned Way
If you’ve ever scanned the internet for Fluid Ounces or Seth Timbs-related material, you may have noticed that it seems like nearly every review from the era of In the New Old-Fashioned Way seemed to make a point of prominently mentioning this song. I know of a couple of fans who place this song in their “Top 5” lists for the band, and although I really like the song, I can’t say I’d place it as high as they do or that I’d consider it one of the two or three most-mentionable songs on what is generally agreed to be the band’s pop masterpiece. It is another in the long line of songs that seem to hop out and greet you as only a track one song can, and I think it was entertained as being the opening track to In the New Old-Fashioned Way since it actually is the first song on the promo versions that were released.
But it is a very clever song about a comic book hero (who is also known as Jean Grey, the one played by the white Bond girl, for those of you who don’t know the X-Men beyond the movies—I always hoped this song would make it onto the soundtrack of one of the films…) with the clever lines, “Marvel Girl’s origin will be explained in the bridge,” pause, then whispers, “bridge.” Seth also exclaims, “Cities fall to rubble as her power unleashes,” which he later mentioned as fitting among the black-listed lyrics after the events of September 11, 2001. But they continued playing the song regularly anyway.
This one was played live regularly up until the latest (and probably final) line-up was christened, and it seems to have fallen permanently to the back-burner with all the new songs that Seth wrote and the large number of songs being considered for revival. Personally, I heard it live too many times and am happy that it’s strictly enjoyed at the beginning of In the New Old-Fashioned Way and remembered on live recordings now (like the video below, another from October 10, 1997, at Main Street).
If you’ve ever scanned the internet for Fluid Ounces or Seth Timbs-related material, you may have noticed that it seems like nearly every review from the era of In the New Old-Fashioned Way seemed to make a point of prominently mentioning this song. I know of a couple of fans who place this song in their “Top 5” lists for the band, and although I really like the song, I can’t say I’d place it as high as they do or that I’d consider it one of the two or three most-mentionable songs on what is generally agreed to be the band’s pop masterpiece. It is another in the long line of songs that seem to hop out and greet you as only a track one song can, and I think it was entertained as being the opening track to In the New Old-Fashioned Way since it actually is the first song on the promo versions that were released.
But it is a very clever song about a comic book hero (who is also known as Jean Grey, the one played by the white Bond girl, for those of you who don’t know the X-Men beyond the movies—I always hoped this song would make it onto the soundtrack of one of the films…) with the clever lines, “Marvel Girl’s origin will be explained in the bridge,” pause, then whispers, “bridge.” Seth also exclaims, “Cities fall to rubble as her power unleashes,” which he later mentioned as fitting among the black-listed lyrics after the events of September 11, 2001. But they continued playing the song regularly anyway.
This one was played live regularly up until the latest (and probably final) line-up was christened, and it seems to have fallen permanently to the back-burner with all the new songs that Seth wrote and the large number of songs being considered for revival. Personally, I heard it live too many times and am happy that it’s strictly enjoyed at the beginning of In the New Old-Fashioned Way and remembered on live recordings now (like the video below, another from October 10, 1997, at Main Street).
Saturday, September 8, 2007
Till the Danger's Past
From the yet-to-be-released Instant Nostalgia
This is my current favorite Fluid Ounces song.
Following the footsteps of “Record Stack,” “Fool Around,” “Big Deal (Out of Nothing),” and a few others I’m sure, Seth wrote this song and initially performed it in another band before assimilating it to the Fluid Ounces canon. I first remember hearing it sometime in 2005 as one of two songs Seth would sing while playing keys for Brent Baltzer’s alt-country outfit Miles of Clear June. I never paid much attention to it until the fall of 2005, in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, when Seth almost apologized for its lyrics as they seem to have been specifically written about that terrible natural disaster, the government’s mishandling of the affair, and the subsequent exodus from the ruined city. The fact that the song is so prophetic speaks volumes of Seth’s imagination that he employs in his songs. I can vouch for hearing it before Katrina, which is hard to believe when you read the words:
“I heard that air raid siren blare
Before the storm blew through the air.
You can’t shoot it down.
You can’t fight it back.
You just hunker down
Till the danger’s past.
And I saw the fool sittin’ on the throne
Like some idiot boy Caesar
In an ancient Rome.
He is a coward,
puffin’ out his chest
Just struttin’ around
Till the danger’s past.
Here comes the rain,
Here comes the flood.
Guess we’ll build a great big boat
And put the pets on board.
Live under water
For the rest of our days
Drink like a fish, anyways.
We’ve got a home
Up in the sky sky sky.
It must be like the perfect drug.
Wake in the morning
feeling fine fine fine,
So happy to see
There’s no damage done.
…
Fire up your engines
Get behind the wheel.
Let that kick drum
Shake your rear view mirror.
Get all your good times
While they last.
Just shine it on
Till the danger’s past.”
This country two-step song got a wonderful make-over in 2006 when Fluid Ounces absorbed it after Seth left Miles of Clear June, mainly because Brian Rogers is a much better guitar player than Brent, and Tha B infused a new sense of life into the number with lots of lead guitar, making it one of my favorites in a Fluid Ounces show where it was not among my favorite Miles of Clear June songs.
This is my current favorite Fluid Ounces song.
Following the footsteps of “Record Stack,” “Fool Around,” “Big Deal (Out of Nothing),” and a few others I’m sure, Seth wrote this song and initially performed it in another band before assimilating it to the Fluid Ounces canon. I first remember hearing it sometime in 2005 as one of two songs Seth would sing while playing keys for Brent Baltzer’s alt-country outfit Miles of Clear June. I never paid much attention to it until the fall of 2005, in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, when Seth almost apologized for its lyrics as they seem to have been specifically written about that terrible natural disaster, the government’s mishandling of the affair, and the subsequent exodus from the ruined city. The fact that the song is so prophetic speaks volumes of Seth’s imagination that he employs in his songs. I can vouch for hearing it before Katrina, which is hard to believe when you read the words:
“I heard that air raid siren blare
Before the storm blew through the air.
You can’t shoot it down.
You can’t fight it back.
You just hunker down
Till the danger’s past.
And I saw the fool sittin’ on the throne
Like some idiot boy Caesar
In an ancient Rome.
He is a coward,
puffin’ out his chest
Just struttin’ around
Till the danger’s past.
Here comes the rain,
Here comes the flood.
Guess we’ll build a great big boat
And put the pets on board.
Live under water
For the rest of our days
Drink like a fish, anyways.
We’ve got a home
Up in the sky sky sky.
It must be like the perfect drug.
Wake in the morning
feeling fine fine fine,
So happy to see
There’s no damage done.
…
Fire up your engines
Get behind the wheel.
Let that kick drum
Shake your rear view mirror.
Get all your good times
While they last.
Just shine it on
Till the danger’s past.”
This country two-step song got a wonderful make-over in 2006 when Fluid Ounces absorbed it after Seth left Miles of Clear June, mainly because Brian Rogers is a much better guitar player than Brent, and Tha B infused a new sense of life into the number with lots of lead guitar, making it one of my favorites in a Fluid Ounces show where it was not among my favorite Miles of Clear June songs.
Thursday, September 6, 2007
Let Him Go (Hats Off to Harrison)
From Awkward Middle Phase: Seth Timbs' Home Demos, Volume One
One of Seth Timbs’ many songs that doubles as a eulogy of sorts. I remember hearing about the death of George Harrison in December, 2001—it’s one of the few times in my life that I’ve felt truly affected by the death of a celebrity. I was in my last week as a college student and working in a public high school. I heard the news on NPR as I rode in, and remembering that all schools are wired in with cable TV (which I never have at home, btw), I tried to see as much rare interview footage that they would milk out of it on every network as a way to deflect the undertow of emotion I was feeling.
This song was one of the few cuts from Awkward Middle Phase that I didn’t already have when it was released in 2006, but it quickly took me back to that deeply affecting moment when I realized that soul, that presence, that force, was not on Earth with us anymore. And even if George Harrison wasn’t really writing music anymore, and I wasn’t buying it if he was, a voice of understanding, love, and compassion had left us for good. We didn’t fully appreciate its presence since it had been singing “Here Comes the Sun” to us since our infancy, but as soon it was gone, it was a blow to us all.
And speaking for the generation of us born after the break-up of the Beatles, Seth finds the words to help us say good-bye, “Let him go. You know it couldn’t last forever.” And then he plays one of the longest guitar solos of any Fluid Ounces recording as if he is single-handedly playing George into the next life as we all tearfully realize that we have to move on in this life without him. It also should be noted that the solo is decidedly in the style of George Harrison, not a balls-to-the-wall McCartney solo like “Taxman,” or an over-the-top Clapton blues solo on “While My Guitar Gently Weeps,” but a melodic solo reminiscent of the decidedly Harrison “Octupus’s Garden” (minus a leslie cabinet) or maybe something off of All Things Must Pass.
I think it speaks to the power of the song that I have re-visited it every time death has visited me since then. Of all the eulogies of different types that Seth has written, I think this one is the strongest as it is the most uplifting.
One of Seth Timbs’ many songs that doubles as a eulogy of sorts. I remember hearing about the death of George Harrison in December, 2001—it’s one of the few times in my life that I’ve felt truly affected by the death of a celebrity. I was in my last week as a college student and working in a public high school. I heard the news on NPR as I rode in, and remembering that all schools are wired in with cable TV (which I never have at home, btw), I tried to see as much rare interview footage that they would milk out of it on every network as a way to deflect the undertow of emotion I was feeling.
This song was one of the few cuts from Awkward Middle Phase that I didn’t already have when it was released in 2006, but it quickly took me back to that deeply affecting moment when I realized that soul, that presence, that force, was not on Earth with us anymore. And even if George Harrison wasn’t really writing music anymore, and I wasn’t buying it if he was, a voice of understanding, love, and compassion had left us for good. We didn’t fully appreciate its presence since it had been singing “Here Comes the Sun” to us since our infancy, but as soon it was gone, it was a blow to us all.
And speaking for the generation of us born after the break-up of the Beatles, Seth finds the words to help us say good-bye, “Let him go. You know it couldn’t last forever.” And then he plays one of the longest guitar solos of any Fluid Ounces recording as if he is single-handedly playing George into the next life as we all tearfully realize that we have to move on in this life without him. It also should be noted that the solo is decidedly in the style of George Harrison, not a balls-to-the-wall McCartney solo like “Taxman,” or an over-the-top Clapton blues solo on “While My Guitar Gently Weeps,” but a melodic solo reminiscent of the decidedly Harrison “Octupus’s Garden” (minus a leslie cabinet) or maybe something off of All Things Must Pass.
I think it speaks to the power of the song that I have re-visited it every time death has visited me since then. Of all the eulogies of different types that Seth has written, I think this one is the strongest as it is the most uplifting.
Monday, September 3, 2007
Poet Tree
From Foreign Legion
It may have been this song that inspired this, but I’m going to share my ultra-super top secret plan with you, dear readers. I want to start a band that only plays songs by Nashville/Murfreesboro pop bands from the last ten years, only play them as a completely commercial country band. I want to see if we can attract major label attention from Music Row (preferably Sony Music, because there’s something about being signed to a company that has both Michael Jackson and Blu-Ray DVDs), before anyone can realize we’re actually playing the wonderful music that’s been under their noses for years. Who’s with me?
Nashville has achieved the title of “The Music City” for God-knows-how-long, and in this dense forest where it seems everyone is a songwriter or a guitar player, where even the cop who pulls you over has a demo tape, Seth Timbs dares to make the poignant observation, “If a tree rocks in the forest, and there’s no one there to hear it, it might be the coolest thing that never reaches your ears.”
At the release party for In the New Old-Fashioned Way, Seth said that the story behind the inspiration of this song was too convoluted to explain, and he would later in an open letter describe the song simply as “a song about a tree who’s into gangsta rap. And the hits keep comin’!!” But the song serves as a eulogy for so many great bands (and dare I say, for Fluid Ounces itself) that have tried to make a name for themselves in the “Music City,” which feels a lot more like “The Musicians’ Graveyard” as I’ve lived here almost ten years and seen the rise and fall of so many amazing acts. Especially since the Features have fallen off the major label circuit, I’m still waiting to see a band come out of Nashville and actually “make it.”
I think this song turns off some listeners because of its use of the blues boogie made cliché during the rock-a-billy era. The other turn-off for some listeners to this song is that the lyrics are almost too clever, the double entendres a little too numerous and over-the-top, starting with its pun for a title. For a while, I’ll admit, I thought that saying, “So put your branches in the air/ And wave them like you’re apathetic,” was going a little too far. I got over that.
This was the first completed track I heard from Foreign Legion since it was available for download some two years before the record came out, and I was all too excited to get it. Once the record was released, I was surprised to find this song as track two, since it is usually played in the latter half of the live sets. I still love the piano solo on the recording, which uses a delightfully dissonant ending, which I wish Seth would utilize sometime when playing this song live. He has over time developed a somewhat scripted piano solo for the song that’s quite different from the recording, as you’ll hear in the live video, and I’ve noticed that the more energetic shows I’ve seen are usually topped off with a more aggressive piano solo on this song.
Speaking of live performances, this song is one of the most famous and energetic set-closers, and ever since Sam Baker re-joined the band in 2001, it seems like it’s the goal to see just how fast they can play it and hold it together. (It has gotten faster than the video presented here, which is from July 7, 2001. Note that during the pause toward the end, you can hear Tom Foolery imitating the woodland noises that you hear on the record.) It has gotten faster and faster over time, just like “Selma Lou” and “Oh, Tatiana,” and I’m always amazed to see Tha B still shred that solo in perfect time despite the tempo. It blows the mind!
I’m also including a live mp3 from The Whole Shebang Record Release show from July 3, 2004, when Popular Genius served as Seth’s backing band. Their horn section even joined them for the end of the set, including this song. You can really hear how much fun Seth is having when they start playing along with him.
Download Live mp3
It may have been this song that inspired this, but I’m going to share my ultra-super top secret plan with you, dear readers. I want to start a band that only plays songs by Nashville/Murfreesboro pop bands from the last ten years, only play them as a completely commercial country band. I want to see if we can attract major label attention from Music Row (preferably Sony Music, because there’s something about being signed to a company that has both Michael Jackson and Blu-Ray DVDs), before anyone can realize we’re actually playing the wonderful music that’s been under their noses for years. Who’s with me?
Nashville has achieved the title of “The Music City” for God-knows-how-long, and in this dense forest where it seems everyone is a songwriter or a guitar player, where even the cop who pulls you over has a demo tape, Seth Timbs dares to make the poignant observation, “If a tree rocks in the forest, and there’s no one there to hear it, it might be the coolest thing that never reaches your ears.”
At the release party for In the New Old-Fashioned Way, Seth said that the story behind the inspiration of this song was too convoluted to explain, and he would later in an open letter describe the song simply as “a song about a tree who’s into gangsta rap. And the hits keep comin’!!” But the song serves as a eulogy for so many great bands (and dare I say, for Fluid Ounces itself) that have tried to make a name for themselves in the “Music City,” which feels a lot more like “The Musicians’ Graveyard” as I’ve lived here almost ten years and seen the rise and fall of so many amazing acts. Especially since the Features have fallen off the major label circuit, I’m still waiting to see a band come out of Nashville and actually “make it.”
I think this song turns off some listeners because of its use of the blues boogie made cliché during the rock-a-billy era. The other turn-off for some listeners to this song is that the lyrics are almost too clever, the double entendres a little too numerous and over-the-top, starting with its pun for a title. For a while, I’ll admit, I thought that saying, “So put your branches in the air/ And wave them like you’re apathetic,” was going a little too far. I got over that.
This was the first completed track I heard from Foreign Legion since it was available for download some two years before the record came out, and I was all too excited to get it. Once the record was released, I was surprised to find this song as track two, since it is usually played in the latter half of the live sets. I still love the piano solo on the recording, which uses a delightfully dissonant ending, which I wish Seth would utilize sometime when playing this song live. He has over time developed a somewhat scripted piano solo for the song that’s quite different from the recording, as you’ll hear in the live video, and I’ve noticed that the more energetic shows I’ve seen are usually topped off with a more aggressive piano solo on this song.
Speaking of live performances, this song is one of the most famous and energetic set-closers, and ever since Sam Baker re-joined the band in 2001, it seems like it’s the goal to see just how fast they can play it and hold it together. (It has gotten faster than the video presented here, which is from July 7, 2001. Note that during the pause toward the end, you can hear Tom Foolery imitating the woodland noises that you hear on the record.) It has gotten faster and faster over time, just like “Selma Lou” and “Oh, Tatiana,” and I’m always amazed to see Tha B still shred that solo in perfect time despite the tempo. It blows the mind!
I’m also including a live mp3 from The Whole Shebang Record Release show from July 3, 2004, when Popular Genius served as Seth’s backing band. Their horn section even joined them for the end of the set, including this song. You can really hear how much fun Seth is having when they start playing along with him.
Download Live mp3
Saturday, September 1, 2007
Big Deal (Out of Nothing)
From The Whole Shebang
This song (sans sub-title) was immediately a crowd pleaser when Seth Timbs added it to the roster of Spike & Mallets songs as he was playing keys and some guitar for that band in late 2000. At the time, the only other song Seth sang lead for Spike & Mallets was “1,000 Ships.” I was very surprised in 2003, upon being handed an advance copy of what would eventually be called The Whole Shebang, that this song had become a Fluid Ounces song.
I’ve always wondered what elements Seth considers when he’s contributing songs to other bands while keeping his own, what would make him decide that one was more suitable for another band than Fluid Ounces, his main song-writing outlet. For example, I don’t know why “What the Hell?” was played live by Fluid Ounces when it sounds more like a Spike & Mallets song both in its instrumentation and subject matter. “Big Deal” fit very well as a Spike & Mallets song, and could have worked well on their CD, Peep, Jr., which featured no Seth songs. It was a welcome addition to The Whole Shebang, and overall serves to improve the record, and I’ve since become accustomed to it as a Fluid Ounces song. Sometimes I’m a little slow in adjusting to change.
This is another song filled with religious imagery, focusing on the parable of the foolish man who built his rock upon the sand, whose house was subsequently destroyed in a flood, versus the wise man who built his house upon the rock and lived happily ever after in his superior choice of building sites. In the tongue-lashing the song gives its addressee, it then goes on to call him or (presumably) her a Philistine, which makes me wonder just how much Bible Seth was reading before penning the words to this one.
The live mp3 presented here is from December 9th, 2005, at Liquid Smoke on the square in Murfreesboro.
Download Live mp3
This song (sans sub-title) was immediately a crowd pleaser when Seth Timbs added it to the roster of Spike & Mallets songs as he was playing keys and some guitar for that band in late 2000. At the time, the only other song Seth sang lead for Spike & Mallets was “1,000 Ships.” I was very surprised in 2003, upon being handed an advance copy of what would eventually be called The Whole Shebang, that this song had become a Fluid Ounces song.
I’ve always wondered what elements Seth considers when he’s contributing songs to other bands while keeping his own, what would make him decide that one was more suitable for another band than Fluid Ounces, his main song-writing outlet. For example, I don’t know why “What the Hell?” was played live by Fluid Ounces when it sounds more like a Spike & Mallets song both in its instrumentation and subject matter. “Big Deal” fit very well as a Spike & Mallets song, and could have worked well on their CD, Peep, Jr., which featured no Seth songs. It was a welcome addition to The Whole Shebang, and overall serves to improve the record, and I’ve since become accustomed to it as a Fluid Ounces song. Sometimes I’m a little slow in adjusting to change.
This is another song filled with religious imagery, focusing on the parable of the foolish man who built his rock upon the sand, whose house was subsequently destroyed in a flood, versus the wise man who built his house upon the rock and lived happily ever after in his superior choice of building sites. In the tongue-lashing the song gives its addressee, it then goes on to call him or (presumably) her a Philistine, which makes me wonder just how much Bible Seth was reading before penning the words to this one.
The live mp3 presented here is from December 9th, 2005, at Liquid Smoke on the square in Murfreesboro.
Download Live mp3
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